Not as badly as aging championship contenders like the Boston Celtics, Dallas Mavericks, San Antonio Spurs and Los Angeles Lakers, but they needed the lockout to end.

With attendance sinking like a rock and on the heels of an uninspiring 60-loss campaign, the team could not afford to alienate the many casual basketball fans it will need to get back on board in order to get attendance back up to snuff.

The hardcore, dedicated hoops fans will always return, but the thousands of harder sells might have balked at paying top dollar in 2012-13 if the lights remained dark.

The detrimental effects a lockout would have had on the development of one of the NBA’s youngest squads would have been as massive as the economic hit to Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment.

They need all the seasoning they can get, even if it is only of the 66-game variety.

This campaign, like the last one, will be more about development than wins and losses.

With the highly touted Valanciunas on board in 2012-13 along with another high lottery pick from what is considered the best draft in years, the existing youngsters will need to perform more like veterans a year from now.

Skipping a season would not only have cut back their growth, but it also would have made it much harder for president/general manager Bryan Colangelo and his staff to figure out just what they have in the group.

Whoever remains in 2012-13 will have had 66 games (plus an abbreviated training camp) to figure out the intricacies of new head coach Dwane Casey’s celebrated defensive schemes. That will be huge if the goal at that time is to finally get back into the playoff picture.

How will the collective bargaining agreement itself impact the franchise? We don’t yet have all the details, but it appears the owners didn’t get the parity-inducing new world order they were after.

Still, it should be a more competitive landscape for perennial also-rans than ever before.

“We feel ultimately it will give fans in every community hope that their teams can compete for championships, and a basis for believing their team (success) will be a function of management of the team rather than how deep the owner’s pockets are or how large their market is,” said deputy commissioner Adam Silver early Saturday morning.

Contract lengths were shortened, an amnesty rule was put in place — both allowing teams to get out of contractual mistakes quicker. Teams under the salary cap will get a new exception that will help them attract free agents; and perhaps most importantly, big spenders will be more restricted in doling out their cash.

For example, non-luxury tax teams will be able to make higher mid-level exception bids for free agents than some big-spenders and the mega-spenders will likely be banned entirely from using the $5 million U.S. MLE if they also want to retain their own free agents.

The luxury tax will also become more punitive depending on how much teams spend. The Raptors have never spent into the tax and given the restrictions, fewer teams likely will overpay to absurd levels.

The Lakers paid $91.3 million in salaries in 2010-11, the Orlando Magic, San Antonio Spurs and Celtics over $70 million. Six other teams, including both finalists exceeded the $60 million mark.

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A lot of people find fault with DeMar DeRozan’s shot selection. Greivis Vasquez is not one of them. Toronto’s backup point guard — inserted as starter Monday in place of Kyle Lowry — is a believer in going with what works and he thinks that the team’s record indicates DeRozan should stick to his guns.